Exceedingly Mundane

I’ve finished a couple of books recently that I wanted to write a quick blurb about. As per usual for me, I don’t write particularly good book reviews. It’s always the same, I read this book and surprise! I liked it!

First up, I finished another book in a series I’m reading, “Blue Shoes and Happiness”, book number 6 in the No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency series, by Alexander McCall Smith. I believe I only have one more book in this series to be current. Alas, McCall Smith has two other series I want to eventually start reading – the 44 Scotland Street series and the Sunday Philosophy Club series. This, of course, is in addition to the 20+ sets of other series books that I have on my list to read one day (and yes, you KNOW I have a list of these!)

Next up, I finished “The Tea House on Mulberry Street” by Sharon Owens. This was a book I had seen mentioned last year sometime on someones blog (although for the life of me, I can’t remember whose!). Sharon Owens is a new author to me, in fact, she’s one I had never heard of. But, the book jacket looked good, and I thought that since my library had it, I would give it a try. I liked it, and it reminded me quite a lot of most of the books I have read by Maeve Binchy, another Irish writer. Their styles were similar, as well as the fact that the books are character driven. I enjoyed “meeting” the owners and patrons of the Muldoon’s Tea House on Mulberry Road, in Belfast, Northern Ireland. I liked seeing where their stories were going, and how it all ended. If you like Maeve Binchy, you would probably like this book.

I also read a Christian fiction book by Liz Curtis Higgs (whose book “Thorn in my Heart” I read recently and enjoyed), called “Mixed Signals”. This was a contemporary book, set in Abingdon Virginia, at an oldies radio station. There are several wonderful characters, and we get to follow along as they start new jobs, fall in love, form lasting relationships, learn to want and ask for forgiveness from long lost family members and friends, etc. This was a really good book that I thoroughly enjoyed. The only negative to this book (as well as to the other Higgs book I read) is that I think this author is a little long-winded for my taste. Don’t get me wrong, I really like her, her books, her characters and the stories. And believe me, I relate to the verbose way of saying things, being guilty of that myself. But, it just seems to take so long to tell the story, her books are a bit on the long side for me. Which is not bad, just a personal preference of mine; I would prefer a bit more brevity.

For the record, that makes a total of 51 books read so far this year, with a total of 15, 880 pages read. Up next is another library book, “Firstborn” by Robin Lee Hatcher. Hatcher is another Christian author I’ve been wanting to try, so picking up a library book is always a good option for me. Most of the books by her in my public library are part of a series, and as much as I love and adore reading series books, I really want to finish some of the series I have in progress before I start anymore. So, I found this book, which appears to be a standalone. Or at least I hope so!

Happy Reading!